Senators suspect Comey lied and plotted to double-cross Trump, seek second special counsel

A plan of action for how a second special counsel can investigate the FBI and Justice Department is spelled out in a point-by-point letter submitted by two Republican senators.

They specifically want to know whether former FBI Director James B. Comey lied to them and had a plan to double-cross President Trump.

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley of Iowa and Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina sent a letter last week to Attorney General Jeff Sessions. They and two other Republicans want a special counsel with the powers of the Trump-Russia probe’s Robert Mueller to investigate suspected Justice Department corruption.

They attached a second letter to Michael E. Horowitz, the Justice Department’s inspector general, outlining all the avenues that need to be navigated — complete with new and expanded accusations. They want an investigation to look at whether Mr. Comey set up Mr. Trump as president-elect.

Mr. Comey visited Mr. Trump for an intelligence briefing at Trump Tower days before he took office. Mr. Comey broke the news about what he called a “salacious and unverified” dossier now known to have been bought by the Democratic Party from its contractor, former British spy Christopher Steele. It told of Mr. Trump supposedly frolicking with prostitutes in Moscow and overseeing Russia’s hacking of Democratic Party computers.

At the moment Mr. Comey called the scintillating dossier “unverified,” the FBI was using it to justify a wiretap on former Trump campaign volunteer Carter Page.

The briefing instantly leaked to CNN, rocking the transition team with a series of unverified dossier accusations. BuzzFeed then posted the 35-page dossier, which remains unconfirmed publicly.

“There is a question as to whether the FBI included the dossier in the briefing, and possibly leaked that it had done so, in order to provide the media a pretext to report on the dossier,” Mr. Grassley and Mr. Graham wrote.

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